Sex discrimination claims

The employment and discrimination team has acted for many women who have been treated less favourably because of their sex. This includes sex discrimination in relation to recruitment, selection for promotion and training and in pay, including cases where women have received lower bonuses than men doing similar work but performing less well than our clients.

Sex discrimination can also occur where a woman is disadvantaged because of an unjustified or unreasonable provision, criterion or practice, which applies to men and women, but particularly disadvantages women, compared to men. For example, requiring full-time or long hours will disadvantage more women than men, as it is still mainly women who take primary responsibility for childcare so cannot work full-time or long hours. The key question then is whether the job can be done on the requested hours and this is for the employer to show.

We act for many women who want to negotiate part-time and flexible hours and obtain compensation for them if their requests are unreasonably refused.
It is also unlawful for service providers such as healthcare providers, social services and retailers including banks, travel agents and travel companies to discriminate on the grounds of sex. Our human rights lawyers have successfully represented people who have suffered discrimination at the hands of many such organisations and have secured compensation and apologies for such discrimination.